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THE WEBB SCHOOLS webb.org
SPRING 202 2 WEBB MAGA ZINE
webbtoday HONORS THE WEBB SCHOOLS
Craftsman Receives Staff Distinguished Service Award Webb craftsman Mario Rodriguez was named the 2021 recipient of the Joann Robinson Staff Distinguished Service Award on October 8, 2021 in recognition of his dedicated service to The Webb Schools. Rodriguez joined Webb in 1988 – just weeks before the schools were rocked by a windstorm, fire and evacuation. His performance during those crises led to his first commendation.
“Your performance both during the windstorm, fire and evacuation was excellent,” said Janet Peddy, Webb’s director of finance, planning and operations. “Your calmness and diligence set a standard for students and faculty alike. And so it has been for the past 33 years. In a variety of roles, Mario has diligently and calmly been taking care of the Webb community.”
Over the 33 years, Rodriguez has shifted jobs from groundskeeper to mechanic, welder and now craftsman. “Mario is multi-skilled and lends his talents wherever needed,” Peddy said. “You can always count on him to be there, day or night, whatever the crisis.”
Vivian Webb Student Named Science Talent Search Scholar Vivian Webb student Fiona Jiang ’22 has been named a Regeneron Science Talent Search Scholar 2022, among just 300 students from 185 high schools across the U.S. recognized for their brilliant entries in the nation’s oldest science competition. The prestigious competition, staged by the Society for Science and Regeneron Pharmaceuticals, counts Nobel Prize winners and MacArthur Grant winners among its alumni. More than 1,800 students enter, 300 are named scholars and 40 are finalists.
“I was really shocked because I did not expect to be named as a scholar, knowing that all of the submitted projects were so amazing,” she said. “This award means a lot to me because it is a recognition of my potential in STEM fields as well as of my project.” Jiang’s project was titled “Characterizing Decades of Technological Advances with Graph Neural Networks: An Innovation Network Perspective.” In it, she analyzes 7 million patents issued by the U.S. Patent Office from 1976 to 2020 to detect patterns in innovation.
